Q.Which is called the lungs of the earth?
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🔒 Start your 14-day free trial to unlock the full solution →Concept understanding — Biotic Regulation Services
Let’s start with something you already know. Imagine a city that has no garbage collectors, no sewage system, no water treatment plant, and no police. Within a week, the streets would be piled with waste, the water would turn foul, diseases would spread, and chaos would take over. That city would become unlivable very quickly.
Now think of the Earth as that city. Who are its garbage collectors, its water purifiers, its pest controllers? The answer is: living organisms — forests, wetlands, soil microbes, insects, birds, and even the fish in the ocean. The work they do, quietly and for free, to keep the planet’s life-support systems running is what we call biotic regulation services.
The word biotic means “related to living things.” Regulation means “keeping something in balance or within safe limits.” So biotic regulation services are the ways in which living organisms maintain the stability of the environment.
The precise meaning
In the language of environmental economics and ecology, biotic regulation services are the benefits that humans receive from the natural functioning of ecosystems that help regulate environmental conditions. These are not things we consume directly (like food or timber), but processes that keep the air breathable, the water clean, the climate stable, and the soil fertile.
The NCERT textbook for Class 12 Geography (Chapter: Environmental Issues) and the Class 12 Biology textbook (Chapter: Biodiversity and Conservation) both emphasise that biodiversity provides these regulatory services. The textbook states that forests, for example, regulate the climate by absorbing carbon dioxide, and wetlands regulate water flow by absorbing floodwaters.
Everyday examples to make it stick
- Forests regulate the climate. Trees absorb carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, and release oxygen. They also release water vapour, which forms clouds and brings rain. Without forests, local climates become hotter and drier.
- Wetlands purify water. When dirty water from farms or cities flows into a marsh, the plants and microbes there trap pollutants, break down waste, and release clean water. This is nature’s own sewage treatment plant.
- Soil microbes regulate nutrient cycles. Dead leaves, animal waste, and other organic matter are broken down by bacteria and fungi. This releases nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus back into the soil, which plants need to grow. Without these microbes, the soil would become sterile.
- Birds and insects control pests. A single pair of barn owls can eat hundreds of rats in a year. Ladybugs eat aphids that would otherwise destroy crops. When we kill these natural predators with pesticides, we lose this free pest control service.
- Coral reefs and mangroves regulate coastal erosion. They act as natural barriers that absorb the energy of waves and storms, protecting coastlines from being washed away.
Why it matters for a commerce/humanities student
You might think: “I’m not a science student, why should I care?” Here’s the thing — these services have enormous economic value. When we destroy forests or drain wetlands, we lose these free services and then have to spend money to replace them with technology. Building a water treatment plant costs crores of rupees. A wetland does the same job for free. When we lose bees (which pollinate crops), farmers have to pay for hand-pollination, which is slow and expensive. …
The Amazon rainforest carries out photosynthesis on a massive scale across its enormous plant biomass, releasing a very large share of the planet's atmospheric oxygen — which is exactly why it earned the popular name 'lungs of the earth'. …
The Amazon rainforest contributes a huge amount of atmospheric oxygen and is popularly termed the 'lungs of the earth'.
The Amazon rainforest is estimated to produce a very large fraction (around 20%) of the total oxygen of the Earth's atmosphere through photosynthesis by its enormous plant biomass. Because of this majo …
- CBSE 2026Set A1 markMCQQ.Which is called the lungs of the earth?(a) Forest(b) Temperate region(c) Amazon rainforest(d) Tropical Savannah
›Reveal solutionSolution
The Amazon rainforest contributes a huge amount of atmospheric oxygen and is popularly termed the 'lungs of the earth'.
The Amazon rainforest is estimated to produce a very large fraction (around 20%) of the total oxygen of the Earth's atmosphere through photosynthesis by its enormous plant biomass. Because of this majo …
- CBSE 2024Set ANNUAL1 markMCQQ.Identify from the following ecologists who stated that increased diversity contributed to higher productivity –(a) Paul Ehrlich(b) David Tilman(c) Robert May(d) Georgy Gause
›Reveal solutionSolution
David Tilman's long-term field experiments established a positive correlation between species diversity and community productivity/stability.
The relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem productivity was demonstrated by David Tilman through long-term ecosystem experiments using outdoor plots that varied in plant species diversity. He found that plots with greater species richness showed higher total biomass productivity and less year-to-year variation in productivity, i.e., diversity contributes to both stability and productivity of a community.
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- CBSE 2024Set ANNUAL1 markMCQQ.Which of the following forest is known as the 'Lungs of the planet'?(a) Forest of Greenland(b) Congo Basin forest(c) Amazon Rain forest(d) Sacred Grooves
›Reveal solutionSolution
The Amazon Rainforest is called the "Lungs of the Planet" for its role in oxygen production and carbon dioxide absorption.
The Amazon Rainforest, spanning much of the Amazon basin in South America (mainly Brazil), is the largest tropical rainforest in the world and is home to an extraordinary diversity of species. Owing to the massive scale of photosynthesis carried out by its vegetation — absorbing huge quantities of atmospheric carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen …
- CBSE 2020Set ANNUAL1 markMCQQ.Which of the following forests is known as 'lungs of the planet'?(a) Tundra forest(b) The Amazon rain forest(c) Tiaga forest(d) Eastern Ghats
›Reveal solutionSolution
The Amazon rainforest of South America is called the 'lungs of the planet' because its enormous plant biomass carries out photosynthesis on a massive scale, producing a large share of the Earth's atmospheric oxygen and absorbing huge quantities of carbon dioxide.
The Amazon basin holds the world's largest tropical rainforest, harbouring an extraordinarily high density and diversity of plant species. Through photosynthesis, this vast expanse of vegetation releases a very large amount of oxygen into the atmosphere and simultaneously acts as a major carbon sink, absorbing carbon dioxide and helping regulate global climate. This immense contribution to atmospheric gas exchange is why it earned the nickname 'lungs of the p …
- CBSE 2020Set ANNUAL1 markQ."Amazon rainforest is called lungs of the planet." Comment.
›Reveal solutionSolution
The Amazon's immense forest cover produces a huge share of the world's oxygen and absorbs vast amounts of CO₂, functioning much like a giant respiratory organ for the planet.
The Amazon rainforest, the world's largest tropical rainforest, is often called the 'lungs of the planet' because its enormous biomass of trees carries out photosynthesis on a massive scale, absorbing a substantial share of the global atmospheric carbon dioxide and, in the process, releasing a very large proportion of the oxygen present in Earth's atmosphere — analogous to how human lungs take in oxygen and expel carbon dioxide, though the Amazon's actual role is more that of a major carbon sink and oxygen source rather than literal 'breathing'. This vast forest plays a crucial role in regulating global climate and atmospheric gas balance, and its ongoing deforestation is therefore a matter of serious global enviro …
- CBSE 2018Set ANNUAL1 markQ.Write two aims of plant conservation.
›Reveal solutionSolution
Plant conservation aims (1) to save plant species and their genetic diversity from extinction, and (2) to sustain the ecosystem services (food, oxygen, medicines, climate and soil regulation) that plants provide.
Concept
Conservation means the protection, careful management and wise use of biological resources. Plants are the producers on which all other life depends, so their protection is central to the survival of biodiversity.
Aims of plant conservation
- Protect species and genetic diversity — prevent the extinction of rare, endemic and economically or medicinally important plants and preserve their gene pool for the future (a source of new crops, medicines and resistant varieties). …
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